mangrove

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

n. Any of several tropical evergreen trees or shrubs of the genus Rhizophora, having stiltlike roots and stems and forming dense thickets along tidal shores.

n. Any of various similar shrubs or trees, especially of the genus Avicennia.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

n. Any of various tropical evergreen trees or shrubs that grow in shallow coastal water.

n. A habitat with such plants; mangrove forest; mangrove swamp.

n. Plants of the Rhizophoraceae family.

n. Trees of the genus Rhizophora.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

n. The name of one or two trees of the genus Rhizophora (Rhizophora Mangle, and Rhizophora mucronata, the last doubtfully distinct) inhabiting muddy shores of tropical regions, where they spread by emitting aërial roots, which fasten in the saline mire and eventually become new stems. The seeds also send down a strong root while yet attached to the parent plant.

n. The mango fish.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

n. A tree of the genus Rhizophora, chiefly R. mucronata (R. Mangle), the common mangrove, abounding on tropical shores in both hemispheres.

n. Another plant of similar habit, especially a plant of the genus Avicennia.

n. In zoology, the mango-fish.

n. Bruguiera Rheedii, a small tree which yields a good tan-bark and a hard, durable, yellowish-brown wood;

n. Heritiera littoralis, a tree of the family Sterculiaceæ. See Heritiera and sundari.

n. a tropical tree or shrub bearing fruit that germinates while still on the tree and having numerous prop roots that eventually form an impenetrable mass and are important in land building

Etymologies

Probably Portuguese mangue (from Taino) + grove.

(American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Circa 1610, corruption of earlier mangrow by folk etymology influence of grove, from Portuguese mangue, from Spanish mangle (or directly from Spanish), from a Caribbean language, possibly Taino, another Arawakan language, or a Cariban language.[2][3] (Wiktionary)

Examples

They say illegal fishing in mangrove forests and habitat destruction in the states of Orissa and West Bengal, in eastern India, has led to a steep fall in crocodile numbers, from several thousand a century ago to less than 100 in the early 1970s.

There are no walks; and if you go one way, you sink knee-deep in mangrove swamps; another you are covered with sand-flies; and a third is crawling up a steep mountain by a mule-path to get a glimpse of the sea beyond the lagoons which surround

In effect, few species can be considered exclusive inhabitants of mangroves, although many are most commonly found associated with mangroves, and it is only in this sense that they can be called mangrove fauna.

It has been suggested that the viviparity of the mangrove is a survival of a very remote period in the development of the earth — that a mangrove swamp represents an age when the earth was enveloped in clouds and mist; and that with the gradual decrease in tepid aqueous vapour the viviparous habit, then almost universal, was lost, except in the case of this plant.

Atlantic, I could not help recalling the mangrove swamps and lagoons of the tropic island in which my childhood had been passed, wondering the while, too, whether the _Josephine_ would not be reported as lost through the protraction of her voyage -- for she was expected to reach

It has been suggested that the viviparity of the mangrove is a survival of a very remote period in the development of the earth -- that a mangrove swamp represents an age when the earth was enveloped in clouds and mist; and that with the gradual decrease in tepid aqueous vapour the viviparous habit, then almost universal, was lost, except in the case of this plant.